Wednesday, February 18, 2009

When $300 Doesn't Seem Like a Lot of Money

There are a lot of good things about being a home-owner. It's been nearly 7 years since my wife dragged me kicking & screaming into our first home & I don't regret it. Having a home means having a dog, a garage with tools & room for all my crap. I like being handy even if my health has curtailed my projects a bit. Still, there's one thing about home-ownership that's not fun: The ever-present fear of that major repair. Today, was one of those days.

Our downstairs toilet & the dishwasher have been backing up. I finally had someone come in and snake the sewer line to the tune of $300. The line is right next to a tree. The guy had a really hard time snaking the line. Yipe! He told me to call the county because the problem spot is where the line meets the street and that it was probably tree roots. If the county won't fix it, the price will start at $1,000 because his boss would have to come out with a team & a camera. Visions of heavy machinery, trenches in my yard, a felled tree filled my head. So much for our savings.

Except, everything is "fine" now. They came out. The blockage is clear. It's all good. Well, it might not be great. It's possible that the snaking is only a temporary fix. It's likely that I'll have to have work done in the future. For now, however, I'll pay my $300 & know that I got off easy.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

$12,000... that's what a new sewer line (partly in the house... and the entire line from the house to the street) and a new water line (because it was too close to the sewer line and it broke while they were digging, but we were told that it wouldn't have been up to code so they would have had to replace it anyway... which is why we paid for it and not the contractor) cost us at the old house.

$300 is cheap. I hope it works. And if they do have to dig... don't stand under any trees. :)